Dicole - New posts

Grumpy old angry young man or ‘how other people are going to ruin my future mornings’

Leo Westerlund — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 19:09:26 +0300

In the last couple of weeks or so, two seemingly insignificant news stories have reached my ears. First, Starbucks announced they enter the Finnish market - yes, there are still markets where the brand isn’t active yet - and second, the main Finnish newspaper, Helsingin Sanomat (HS), revealed plans to move from broadsheet to tabloid format.

My somewhat antihipsteresque circle of acquaintances, all but a few easily described as knowledge workers or belonging to the creative class, seems to greet both these developments with either joy or indifference. The positive commentary include notions such as “finally I’m able to read a real newspaper on the train” or “not having a Starbucks is like not being a part of the civilised world, you know.”

At first glance, these issues have nothing to do with one another. Nevertheless, for perhaps the first time in my life I feel strongly opposed to changes that have no direct impact on my life whatsoever. Indeed, I do not subscribe to HS, and I do not expect to use the services of the Starbucks brand to any great extent (if at all as they open only two shops at the Helsinki-Vantaa airport). And no, I have nothing against Starbucks or coffee shops in general – nor do I have a bad thing to say about printing news on a sheet of paper of a size more practical and easy to handle than its larger alternative. So, I guess I have to elaborate what I mean a little.

As stated above, these things have no direct effect on my life, so my opposition must be largely a matter of sentiment. And yes, reading a broadsheet has a taste of elitism in it even if I did not necessarily admit I felt overtly joyous for being a fresh link in a chain that includes British aristocracy who had servants to iron their papers in order not to get their hands stained with ink. But I do feel that the quite impractical size of broadsheet newspapers gives them sort of poise and importance where the very impracticality of the medium holds children back from disturbing their parents’ reading activities.

Hold on, there is a logic to this all.

HS has surely done extensive research into their subscribers and readers and has been able to confirm that the change ensures them better revenue. This is all fine and dandy – I expect it to be true. Furthermore, despite the fact that someone might argue that publishing real newspapers in the same size as yellow press sends out a message to the less informed readers that all the tabloid size papers are reliable sources of news and information, I am only a wee bit worried about the substance of newspaper journalism; there might have been a slight shift towards a more tabloidy way of expression in broadsheets worldwide and I fear this trend continues in the near future, but it has nothing to do with the actual size of the paper. For a bit of discussion regarding the state of Finnish media (in English), click here.

Starbucks has become a sort of an epitome of coffee on the go through shrewd service design and careful brand management. Changing from broadsheet to tabloid enables HS readers to feed their news hungry minds likewise on the go – as showcased in the quote above. Once coffee and newspapers become largely consumed on the go by the populace, the practicality of it becomes the norm, it becomes the meme: not taking time to go through these activities becomes a cultural imperative, i.e. a "system that is unconsciously imposed on a group or individual by the greater society.” [1]

It is bah-bye to the leisure of slow workday mornings where you get up at five o’clock to have time to properly wake up with the help of coffee and the daily paper. It is just so much more efficient to wake up little later, to pick up your coffee and news on the way to work and so forth. What it turns out to be is a vicious cycle of haste.

As an advocate of slow life, I feel it is my responsibility to shout out against take away coffee and the tabloid format. It is perhaps wise to stress that I have no intention of blaming Starbucks or HS for such projected misfortune. And even if the hurly-burly haste and the mobility of everything may form the underpinnings of the contemporary zeitgeist, it is the responsibility of us all, us people, not to let things slip out of control and force us to lose one of the greatest sources of joy and true happiness; long slow Monday mornings in the company of our loved ones.

[1] http://yuutokun.wordpress.com/2006/11/04/cultural-imperatives/

Some Notions Regarding Ubiquitous Society

Leo Westerlund — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 12:44:11 +0300

Ubique et nusquam are the words used by Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard to explain that albeit the divine is constantly present everywhere, its presence cannot be attributed to any particular place in space or time[i]. Again and again the contemporary discussion regarding the emergence of the ubiquitous society reminds me of these three words.

Ubiquitous computing revolves around the idea of being able to control our environment and household items through a (global) network and to connect to the network through objects in our vicinity. Such a setting surely equals ubiquitousness, but it is already rather difficult to find a location where access to the Internet would prove impossible, at least in an urban setting. In other words, the Internet is already accessible everywhere; its presence is ubique, yet ubiquitous computing only awaits us in the future. Where’s the catch?

In fact, the term ubiquitous society is somewhat misleading. Being connected to the Internet through many different channels simultaneously even without our knowledge or consent equals not only an Internet that is everywhere but an Internet that is nowhere in particular; perhaps it would be appropriate to discuss “nusquamous computing” instead.

The idea of a ubiquitous society causes fears partly because the terminology is still unclear or even unheard of to many, but also for genuine, understandable reasons. Yet the fears are often discarded as irrelevant, false, or unjustified. In the following I attempt to shed light on the underlying factors that give the fears about ubiquitousness some justification.

The lack of control over our own connections and therethrough over the information we share and transmit constitutes a serious problem where information structure, authority structure, and equiveillance are concerned. Equiveillance is a term used to describe the balance between external surveillance and sousveillance, i.e. self-generated information regarding our own doings. Societies use surveillance to improve the security of their constituents, but at times its effect on our sense of security is the opposite: surveillance cameras are often considered to cause fears.

Ubiquitous computing, by definition, gathers and centralizes information, thus creating a more centralized authority structure between actors in a society or an overtly authoritarian status for the state over its population. Such a structure – at least when coupled with a lowered sense of security amongst the population – characteristically inflicts segregation between individuals and different groups inside a society. Every society that wishes to embrace freedom and equality has to steer away from such centralization to minimize segragation and inequality between its constituents. In other words, the ubiquitous society, as promoted by the technologically religious, can easily be seen to threaten our freedom and equality as well as our (sense of) security.

The threats posed by centralized information become rather clear through an idea that Daniel Ellsberg states[ii] he presented to Henry Kissinger in 1968 when the latter was appointed U.S. national security advisor for the Nixon regime. In short, Ellsberg told Kissinger who was about to gain access to loads of classified information that this new information would provoke three reactions. First reaction would be that of gratitude and joy for the access to the information. Second reaction would be Kissinger to feel dumb because he had not known or understood this or that issue before. The third and most problematic reaction would be that of deafness towards others who do not have access to the same information: the words “if they only knew what I know” describe this emerging deafness to the point.

Further, a centralized authority structure and lack of equiveillance are best described using an uttermost example: the Panopticon, i.e. the model prison conceptualized in 1785 by English philosopher Jeremy Bentham. As a prison, the Panopticon revolves around the idea that inmates have no means to observe each other or know when or from where the authority observes them. The prisoners do know, however, that they may be under observation at any given time. Michel Foucault[iii] widened the use of the concept to the societal level and claimed, in fact, that the relationship between the state and its population in modernized societies resembles panopticism. A panoptic society depends on a centralized authority structure and absolute (panoptical) surveillance, i.e. lack of equiveillance.

Turning our everyday environment and objects into information processing units that constantly share data with each other and produce information about us and our behaviour certainly enables ways to improve our lives, but the increasingly centralized information and authority structures entailed by ubiquitousness contradict our equality and our sense of security and perhaps even our security per se. It is easy to understand critical approaches towards this development.

A mere promise of objective and unintrusive use of the information produced through and by ubiquitous technology is insufficient to alleviate these fears because it is impossible and outright stupid for any authority to “know” who is to assume power in the future, in effect making it impossible to know how the gathered information will be used. New legislation regarding electronic surveillance and control of Internet usage is pending or on the drawing board in many countries all over the globe. Building up a technological utopia under the name of ubiquitous society hand in hand with dystopian legislation that enables authorities to follow who does what and where is most definitely not a road to follow.

We need thorough, wide-ranging, and far-reaching discussion on how to prevent these fears from materializing, and perhaps we are able to solve some of the problems on the horizon. We need to reach beyond and see through the deceptive benefits of “nusquamous technology” in order to ensure that we do not, in trying to create a society that functions better, create inequality and limit freedom instead; thereby destroying the very corner stones our societies are built on.

[i] Kierkegaard, Søren (1846): Concluding Unscientific Postscript to the Philosophical Fragments

[ii] (2009) The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers

[iii] Focault, Michel (1975): Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison

Some Notes about Future Service Architectures in the Ubiquitous Society

Jari Kaivo-oja — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 14:04:37 +0300

As curious persons, we are passionate about new ideas and inventions that promise to transform our lives and create new opportunities. We like to rapidly replace old technologies with new ones. There are two philosophies to change our service architectures. First is based on the idea “build to last”. Another is the idea “built to be changed”.

These alternative philosophies lead us two alternative service architecture planning models. In the first one you plan such service architectures which are going to be very sustainable. The second one leads us to plan modular service architectures. Both planning philosophies are having their benefits and costs. It is very important to decide which philosophy is applied in a design architecture project.

Today it is not possible to develop service architectures without software and hardware concepts. Futuristic software concepts contribute to the all modern service architectures. This is a starting point to service architecture planning. Ubiquitous computing innovations are today changing the realities of service architecture planning.

As we know well, ubiquitous computing is roughly the opposite of virtual reality. Virtual reality society puts people inside a computer-generated world, but ubiquitous computing forces the computer to live out here in the world with human beings. Virtual reality is primarily a horse power problem. We can easily predict that ubiquitous computing is a very difficult integration of human factors, computer science, engineering, and social sciences. That is why multidisciplinary approach is necessary professional approach to build the future ubiquitous society which really works well.

Awareness about these ubi-innovations and ubi-inventions is a necessary element for successful service architectures and designs. Customer driven service architectures are very much needed when new Web 3.0 and Web 4.0 architectures emerge in the following years. Especially Privacy Enchancing Technologies (PETs) must be an elementary part of new ubiquitous service architectures. Obviously we also need more software diversity in the future. Heterogeneous computing landscapes provide more promising future horizon for modern service architectures than massive homogenous computing landscapes with associated service architectures. There is need to develop new planning and modeling processes, standards and practices.

We shall also need more holistic perspective to service design management. Conventional reductionist modeling perspective will probably produce more heavy costs than holistic planning approach. The new modeling paradigm embodies the analysis, design, and architectural disciplines that are being pursued during a given project. Also innovative learning and validation processes are needed to test the new service architectures and designs.

Prosumerism and crowdsourcing

Jari Koskinen — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 16:05:17 +0300

Research shows that perhaps the most essential phenomenon related to consuming and consumption is the increase in customers’ willingness to tune and customize products and services to suit their own needs. This is clearly visible, for example, in real estate development and housing.

This development is currently taking a step forward: we now discuss prosumers who take part in the production of their own services in cooperation with service providers. This theme includes the idea of customer-driven innovation where end users take part in product and service development and innovation activities.

Futurist Paul Saffo is currently talking about The Creator Economy: “Well I think there is one central issue above all others in this innovation economy, and that is what is the shape of a new emergent economy. And we've heard words like prosumer implying really that what we have is the new kind of economic participant who does not merely purchase things and consume and does not merely produce things which used to be the vision but the new economy is built around new kind of economic actor that does both at once. My preferred term is creator not creative, creatives are the leads who made things that hang on walls and we pay money for it, but the creator economy is one of which ordinary folks like us in a course of our day engaging economic acts that once consume and create.”[1]

Timo Brown continues: “The early examples are Google, Facebook, Twitter, Wikipedia, Threadless. These all rely on their ability to generate participation and through that create individual and group value.”[2]

The Creator Economy or prosumerism is very closely connected to phenomenon called DIY (Do It Yourself). Mark Frauenfelder, one of the most influential people inside the movement describes:

"You know one of the things I'm interested in is makers and the effect they are having on a world. You mentioned little earlier about prosumers. I think that you see that happen more and more on innovation. The resent example I know about is with the expresso machines (…) so people who are expresso machine hackers, just individuals who buy espresso machines in last few years have been taking the machines apart (…) The espresso machine manufacturers have been around hundred years but their innovation is very slow, they are very cautious and they don't want to try anything new but these hackers are trying all shorts of things (…) and manufacturers are now incorporating these changes in to their machines (…) so this was a very consumer-driven innovation (…) Individuals out there are free to experiment and free fail, and they are doing it to themselves and companies are learning from them."[3]

Another issue related to the same field is crowdsourcing, which is the act of outsourcing tasks, traditionally performed by an employee or contractor, to an undefined, large group of people or community (a "crowd"), through an open call.[4] It also used to describe the idea that masses act as a database for information exchange and service development. The term was first coined by Jeff Howe in his Wired magazine article (2006).[5]

We anticipate that crowd-accelerated innovations transform consuming and consumption into something new in the next few decades.

Consumer groups can be categorised using alternative terms; the first groups to adapt new ideas are called forerunners (or trendsetters) and early adaptors (or early mainstreamers). On average these consumer groups are more common in the y and z generations born in the 80s or later than in older age cohorts. Looking from a wider perspective, this range of phenomena can be called the participatory economy. In addition, the Makers Movement and DIY (Do-It-Yourself) culture are key parts of an economy that promotes participation (see Mark Frauenfelder’s example earlier).

The changes in consumer culture and consumers’ increased participation in production are supported by foreseeable changes in innovation activities. Current debate includes concepts such as open, radical, social, user-oriented, and crowdsourcing-based innovation. We anticipate prosumerism to be more of a rule than an exception by the year 2015 and that both companies and their customers profit from cooperative innovation as well as shared product and service development.

The interviewees pointed out the increasing trend of personal customization and co-design – in terms of being a developer of the service what he/she needs and also in greater involvement in design development processes:

“People are increasingly interested in ‘taking care of their own sphere of services’, and therefore different systems and ‘service products’ need to be developed (designed) to let people take care of (choose and manage) their own (and individualized) services.” [41]

“Future where C2C (consumer-to-consumer) services will become increasingly common. This means, for example, that people living in one area of a town begin to provide a service that used to be a public service or one offered by a company. The service could be based on crowdsourcing, social media, ad hoc networks built to surpass costly operators, etc.” [50]

“Design will have an increasing role in solving societal issues. Consumers feel that they can take part in the development and planning of services offered in their home town or neighbourhood. Dell and Starbucks have promoted customer participation in the design of their products for a long time already, and other businesses are now willing to follow suit.” [50]

The changes of the consumer culture are accelerated by a shift from information society to ubiquitous society. Our built environment is becoming increasingly mediated, modifiable, and adjustable. This means that individuals are able to affect the atmosphere of the built environment (imagery, scents, soundscape, and colours) or even physical shapes (e.g. David Fisher’s dynamic architecture[6]). Service development and individuals’ possibilities to influence their own environment are essentially affected by new fields of expertise such as geo-information. Pervasive computing, utilisation of geo-information, crowdsourcing and increased interaction cause worries: are our societies changing into dystopias where people are constantly under the eye of the big brother and where even the most positive developments take place at the expense of privacy and personal freedom?

[1] THE CREATOR ECONOMY. Interview of Paul Saffo at the J-7, The Seventh Conference on Innovation Journalism, STORYTELLING IN THE TIME OF CREATIVE DESTRUCTION, Stanford University, 7-9 June 2010 by Sofi Kurki & Jari Koskinen, Finland Futures Research Centre, University of Turku.

[2] Brown, Tim (2008). The Creator Economy. http://designthinking.ideo.com/?p=198

[3] Interview of Mark Frauenfelder in San Francisco, 14 June 2010 by Jari Koskinen & Sofi Kurki, Finland Futures Research Centre, University of Turku.

[4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crowdsourcing

[5] Howe, Jeff (2006). The Rise of Crowdsourcing. Wired, issue 14.06. http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.06/crowds.html

[6]Web: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biNVTsaeCc4

The relationship between art and design

Jari Koskinen — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 13:41:50 +0300

Visionary Bruno Munari wrote already 1960^th: “Today it has become necessary to demolish the myth of the ‘star’ artist who only produces masterpieces for a small group of ultra-intelligent people. It must be understood that as long as art stands aside from problems of life it will only interest a very few people.” [1]

It seems to us that ‘star’ designer is living well in 2010^th. Wow architecture gathers attention and many designers still act (and are treated) like stars. The spirit of public and media reporters is still supporting the ‘star’ image.

It is basically true that the roots of design are in arts and crafts, but maybe it is difficult to see the relationship between arts and service design.

One of our interviewees may have provided an answer to this problem when talking about the future master education of service design:

”I’d make sure that all participants have a good enough background in both theoretical and practical aspects – lots of philosophy and arts (art productions). Arts enable designers to think about issues more widely. In the new media field everybody has to be able to code. Basic logic (a part of philosophy) should be studied and competence in research methods acquired. A scientific and systematic approach towards analyses has to exist – as does the ability to prepare for planning/design work.” [39]

The respondent has very positive remarks on art and its role in service design education. He takes both practical and theoretical aspects into consideration.

The relationship between art and design has been somewhat complicated and there is no clear picture how the roles of art and design ultimately differ. Some are saying that if design is good enough it becomes art. One great design thinker Kenya Hara has written some very good analysis about the relationship:

Art is an expression of an individual’s will to society at large, one whose origin is very much of a personal nature. So only the artist knows the source of his own work. This loftiness is what makes art so cool. Of course, there are plenty of ways to interpret the expressions that artist give birth to. Non-artist commune with art by coming up with interesting interpretations of art, appreciating it, commenting on it, re-editing art as in an exhibition, or using art as intellectual resource (…) Design, on the other hand, is basically non self-expression. Instead, it originates in society. The essence of design lies in the process of discovering a problem shared by many people and trying to solve it. Because the root of the problem is within the society, everyone can understand the plans for solutions and processes for solving the problem, in addition to being able to see the problem from designer’s perspective. Design is appealing because the process creates inspiration that is engendered by this empathy among human beings in our common values and spirituality.”[2] Hara goes even further: “Verbalizing design is another act of design.[3]

How we could think of a designer as auteur when we talk about service design: “It’s always easier to evaluate a creation in terms of its relationship to its creator. So what happens to the idea of authorship when many hands are involved in bringing something to life.”[4] Service design is cross-disciplinary, collaborative form of work. Service design is done many times anonymously, but sometimes there is an auteur or auteurs.

One of the greatest missions of design educators in last decades has been to develop recognizable handwriting or style for each of their students. Own style can be a very effective strategy for success. On the other hand, clinging to one’s own style can be a very, very bad strategy. Different clients want different styles for different purposes. And talking about service design, one’s own style sounds weird all in all.

[1] Munari, Bruno (2008). Design as Art. Penguin Books. (first published by Editori Laterza 1966).

[2] Hara, Kenya (2008). Designing Design. Lars Muller Publishers. Second Edition.

[3] Ibid.

[4] Bierut, Michael (2007). Seventy-Nine Short Essays on Design. Princeton Architectural Press.

Break of disciplinary silos

Jari Koskinen — Thu, 24 Nov 2011 20:59:12 +0300

The process where the problem solving and scientific thinking moves from disciplinary silos or domains to cross-disciplinarity, where phenomena are treated as unities that cannot be fully understood by breaking them into pieces that are studies just from one angle. Instead what is needed is true co-operation between experts and traditions of various fields.

In the current societal, economical and cultural situation, good ideas and concepts have become the most essential intangible capital. The logic of continuous development was the means of operation in the industrial era, but it is no longer enough to survive the competition. Nowadays the competition has to be beat through innovation. There is a dire need for radical and systemic innovations.

There is no simple path to success. Life and the world are complex up to such a degree that success requires the right circumstances and timing just as well as precise and creative steps. However, it can be noted that creative concepts that connect different competences and different viewpoints increase in importance all the time.

Interviewees pointed out the need for comprehensive and non-silo thinking from the viewpoint of design as well as from the companies’ activities and service development processes in general.

“Breaking down silos and convergence of design fields will play a role in the future /.../.” [50]

“Reductions in silo-like thinking in companies make the use of comprehensive customer viewpoints possible.” [46]

“Change is born out of breaking down the barriers between the different fields of design as well as between design and other fields of expertise. In the future, there is no division in service development that follows the curricular borders of academic institutions. In working life, whole processes are planned from the customer viewpoint and the created service incorporates all the needed fields of competence. The value of service design is measured by the end result, by the created service per se.” [39]

“What’s needed is the ability to integrate various elements of a service to each other, the ability to integrate information systems to each other in order to streamline their usability and to advance their compatibility. Where information systems are concerned, this is a “common mantra” nowadays. Service integration means taking multiple issues simultaneously into consideration; this means that, for example, (randomly picking up issues from the list of fields used in the interview) architectural and multisensory design viewpoints have to be taken into account at the same time. In a sense, the integration of service elements is a form of art.” [33]

“We need more disruption, breaking of existing models of thinking and operational processes. We need some kind of a Derridian deconstruction of design; we need to smash The Vase designed by Alvar Aalto and glue the pieces back to form something new.” [42]

“The operational environment of small businesses is filled with just the same sort of service development challenges as larger companies. In big firms, comprehensive thinking about services from the customer viewpoint is more easily misguided because development activities take place quite a distance away from the customers. Various branches and professionals of different fields aim to optimize their own part of the service chain – perhaps without ever even meeting clients or other employees taking part in the production of the service. In the research department of big companies, there might be someone thinking things through from a customer perspective, but this information is not usually heard well enough in business or development activities. In other words, big businesses easily find themselves following signals from different channels separately from each other and thus create silo-like thinking even though clients only have a single customer experience: if the parking places are all taken or the lavatory smells dubious, the overall experience is bad even if everything else is done according to the highest standards.” [50]

Service Design – what is it?

Jari Koskinen — Thu, 24 Nov 2011 14:42:47 +0300

We are currently conducting research on the evolution of expertise in (service) design as a part of ServiceD project. Service design is a young field of expertise and related competences and skills are only being shaped. The situation is very interesting: internationally there are many different definitions of service design. At the same time new competence areas and skills are linked to service design. This kind of adventure in the in-betweens and the search for what is bubbling under opens up fascinating new views.

There is a power struggle going on: whose definitions, methods, and expertise categorisations will prevail? For example, service design agencies push their own methods to the market as general truths. There is a genuine need for analysis and critique.

I would prefer if the situation remained as open as it is now.

As soon as the field starts to build too many silos, competence areas become stuck within their boundaries. Disturbingly our research shows that signs of silo-like thinking are already emerging in service design. Some books on service design are, in fact, even surprisingly methodical by nature.

”Our” new field, service design, is a mater of pride for some and a means for marketing something new. As a by-product of the emergence of the field, some advertising professionals have started using the title ’service designer’ without any experience in the area.

Doctor Atomic and the Magic of “Gesamtkunstwerk”

Sam Inkinen — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 23:39:07 +0300

I recently visited the Finnish National Opera. On programme there was Doctor Atomic by the contemporary composer John Adams. I greatly enjoyed the high-quality, minimalistic music and the strong libretto with lots of meaningful messages and ethically serious topics. This kind of opera makes you seriously think and contemplate. To cite Opera’s information pages:

“The contemporary opera Doctor Atomic transports us back to July 15, 1945, when preparations for the first test of an atomic bomb are underway. Scientists aren’t quite sure what will happen – only one things is certain: the world will never be the same again.”

In my opinion Doctor Atomic made a great evening with strong emotions, deep thoughts and sublime horizons! Inspiring music, actors, the decor and general set-up in an outstanding opera house in Helsinki (with some great architecture both inside and out) create an art spectacle and a sort of “artificial” or “virtual” reality. It seems an opera experience can also and obviously be a fantastic spectacle from service and design points of view.

The classic Gesamtkunstwerk approach (i.e. a total art work) by composer Richard Wagner (1813–1883) comes to my mind and is worth mentioning here: the idea of a massive work of art that combines and shakes different human senses. In a way this classical Wagnerian approach to opera art resembles also super effects, multimediality and synesthesia in the context of today’s audiovisual media culture. In addition to Wagner, the remarkable Russian composer of Romanticism Alexander Scriabin (1872–1915) should be mentioned here – especially his works at the beginning of the 20^th century expressing synesthesia and mysticism.

Synesthesia, multimodality and hypertextuality are a relevant field of study, for example, in the context of music videos and computer games, which are a seminal part of today’s popular culture. It can be said that the most important feature of a music video is often the link it activates between the senses: making sound visual, and movement and colour audible.

In fact, there are several reasons for calling music videos imagined music. The director and writer of a video creates powerful and enjoyable sensory experiences. He/she illustrates the musical piece with synesthetic associations and creates with his/her creative mind new forms of audiovisual combinations.

We can now say that the best and most ambitious music videos have represented the aesthetic avant-garde of the last decades. Synesthesia explains a lot about the enjoyability of music videos and other forms of audiovisual media culture. It can be said that the visual pleasure of music videos is not so much connected with narrativity as with making television (or a computer screen) more musical.

Quo vadis, audiovisual culture? And what can we learn from the classics? Some of the most notable renewers of audiovisual media culture in the 20^th century have been Russian film director Sergei Eisenstein (1898–1948) and French film director Jean-Luc Godard (1930–). Their thinking and audiovisual works also contain relevant elements regarding synesthesia and a sort of “total experience.” Some other relevant names of significant avant-gardists and innovators include Abel Gance (1889–1981), Walther Ruttmann (1887–1941), Len Lye (1901–1980), Oskar Fischinger (1900–1967), Kenneth Anger (1930–) and Walt Disney (1901–1966).

Literature:

Inkinen, Sam (2004). Cross-Media Age. Aspects of Media Cultural Trends and Digital Technologies. In: Korpiaho, Mervi & Korhonen, Mikko et al., Multi-Channel Solutions. Helsinki: IT Press.

Inkinen, Sam (2008). Quo vadis, homo ludens? (preface). In: Fernandez, A. & Leino, O. & Wirman, H. (eds.), Extending Experiences. Rovaniemi: Lapin yliopistokustannus, pp. 9–17.

Ylä-Kotola, Mauri & Inkinen, Sam & Isomäki, Hannakaisa (eds.) (2005). The Integrated Media Machine. Aspects of Future Interfaces and Cross-Media Culture (volumes 3–4). Rovaniemi: University of Lapland.

Homo ludens, Homo creativus, Homo connectus - Some Profiles of (Future) Human Beings

Sam Inkinen — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 20:29:58 +0300

I have already earlier written about homo ludens and the new ethos of creativity. It is pretty interesting how the notion homo ludens has become popular in the contemporary discussion.

It seems we have understood that a human being is not just a homo economicus of economic rationality nor the engineering blacksmith of homo faber but also a playful human. The famous key work regarding this thematics is the classic book Homo Ludens (1938) by the Dutch cultural historian Johan Huizinga (1872–1945).

Huizinga's main idea is that even “unnecessary” challenges seem to play a remarkable role in the advancement and development of the human culture. Works of art, games, sports, festivals and carnevals are deeply rooted phenomena of humanity – even though they are not the results of straightforward need or necessity.

Homo ludens has been a key term not only in academic discourse but, for example, in the advertising and design world. As an opposite to the traditional homo economicus or homo faber who stress the importance of rational thinking, quantity and concrete goals, homo ludens knowingly seeks for new experiences, plays around with possibilities, embraces the idea of freedom and is happy to take risks to obtain new sensations.

A reference to the French word bricolage might add some interesting depth to this discussion. 'Bricolage' is used to mean the building, the assembly or hobby-like hand crafting, and it acts as a nice metaphor of creative processes and do-it-yourself attitude. As we know, creativity is often defined as a process of assembling – a process where something new and extraordinary is built with new combinations.

Being creative means to combine separate and sometimes distant elements into new forms and combinations. The process of creativity can also be defined as a process to create a product or a service that can be considered a new one. This is a relevant viewpoint for service design activities and design professionals, too.

In addition to homo ludens, some other phrases starting with the word 'homo' have been used to describe the contemporary members of the information and media society. Aki Järvinen, a researcher of digital culture has used the phrase homo aestheticus-informaticus to describe the knowledge-intensive type of contemporaries who nevertheless stresses the importance of aesthetic values and new sensations (art, design, experiences, entertainment industry, etc.).

And it seems to us that the contemporary human is, indeed, homo connectus and homo creativus: the creative contemporary actively searching for new links, nodes and connection points in the digital information networks.

Literature:

Inkinen, Sam (2008). Quo vadis, homo ludens? (preface). In: Fernandez, A. & Leino, O. & Wirman, H. (eds.), Extending Experiences. Rovaniemi: Lapin yliopistokustannus, pp. 9–17.

Järvinen, Aki (1999). Hyperteoria. Lähtökohtia digitaalisen kulttuurin tutkimukselle. Nykykulttuurin tutkimusyksikön julkaisuja 60. Jyväskylä: Jyväskylän yliopisto.

Järvinen, Aki & Mäyrä, Ilkka (eds.) (1999). Johdatus digitaaliseen kulttuuriin. Tampere: Vastapaino.

Elements of service design #1

Tuomo Kuosa — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 14:41:40 +0300

According to Reima Rönnholm, service design includes five main elements that separate it from other fields of design and thus make it unique.

The first and foremost element of SD is the prioritization of revenue creation for the client. SD has to find solutions that enable the designed service to create additional value where the needs and business of the client is concerned. This is why SD has to understand business and be able to assess whether a given service is functional and relevant for the client’s business operations.

The second element is understanding the customers. This means that service designers have to be conscious of customers being integrated to all phases of a service process.

The third element is holistic understanding of the client’s needs and the means to solve related problems. All the parts and phases of a service create a unified whole for the customers, but traditionally all the actors providing the service have not worked closely with each other. Service design has to be able to break down silos without becoming a silo of its own.

The fourth element is the coordination of multi-disciplinarity. This means that service design has to be able to bring business skills, understanding of customer needs and spatial design competences together so that the designed service serves both business operations and customers.

The fifth element is quick prototyping. Because service design deals mainly with immaterial issues that are brought to life through concrete actions, quick illustration and iteration hold key positions of a service design process.

Ideation and Concept Design #1

Jari Koskinen — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 17:14:54 +0300

“Unless we invent a better future, we won’t have one of any kind”
–Arthur C. Clarke

Ideation and concept design are key elements of service design. In the current socio-cultural and financial environment new ideas and concepts are the most valuable immaterial assets (alongside competences and brands).

Many are willing to traverse the realm of blue ocean strategies – and it is easy to believe that new ideas and concepts are being created with little or no hindrance and child-like enthusiasm. However, this is not the case. Unfortunately various mental hurdles and cultural limitations block creativity.

Indeed, ideation and concept design are difficult tasks to be done in a result-oriented manner unless the related limitations and hurdles are dealt with openly. Issues blocking the creation of new ideas can include, for example, lack of courage or the need to “play it safe”. In my opinion, the tendency to avoid mistakes and to concentrate on grey everyday work is one of the key problems in contemporary Finland. A further problem is that of copying. Authenticity does not come easy.

Some of the limiting factors are unconscious. For example, our world view, faith, or conviction can hinder ideation by allowing only such solutions and ideas that fit our own preconceptions of the world. Another unconscious factor could be what I call the “not invented by us” phenomenon. Other sorts of cultural issues (such the Finnish compulsion to use blue in all marketing and communication material due to it being a national colour) and subjective conceptions about what is acceptable and what not can form unnecessary and unconscious limitations for creativity.

Financial reasoning comes into play as well: ever too often new, original concepts are perceived as unprofitable expenses instead of as investments into the future. Other often stated reasons include “not in line with our strategy” or ”someone else is responsible for this in our company” (a great example of silo-like thinking)

Free ideation is also restricted due to organisational culture and hierarchy (who is allowed to innovate and in what domain). Limitations caused by power structures are sometimes the most difficult to solve. However, it cannot be stressed enough that design thinking requires the empowerment of employees and clients: good ideas can and should come from any possible source.

I think that it is essential to openly discuss the restrictions and limitations that hinder creativity before moving on to ideation and concept creation. In the workshops I have led, openness has provided mainly positive experiences. Another key issue that needs to be addressed immediately is to identify the challenge or problem that needs to be solved. It might as well be that such an identification process ends up in finding a wider challenge or a more substantial opportunity than what the original starting point for the workshop ever was.

On Service Design Critique #2

Jari Koskinen — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 00:56:20 +0300

“People ask for criticism, but they only want praise.”
–W. Somerset Maugham

Critique is a part of the everyday in visual arts, movies, and music, but we suffer from a lack of design critique. Mainstream newspapers (such as the Finnish Helsingin Sanomat) discuss design mostly through nearly ad-like articles. This is the case in almost all media coverage of design. Luckily the situation is somewhat better internationally than in Finland.

One reason for the lack of critique in Finland is the non-intellectual traditions regarding design. We are used to praising old “stars” and “heroes” of design and we feel a sort of national pride for their accomplishments. The long shadow of tradition has played its part is blocking development paths that might have promoted critique. We seem to operate by mere gut feeling or opinion; what is said is irrelevant, what matters is who says it.

We live in a time where the artificial divisions between researchers, consultants, authors, teachers, and workers are becoming outdated. Service design is an example of a competence area where professionals from a wide variety of fields – from cultural anthropologists to theatre pros and from futures researchers to cartoonists – work together. Furthermore, the range of competences a service designer may (and should) possess is getting wider and wider. Service design is characteristically multidisciplinary and multidimensional work where extremes collide and merge; research transforms into strategies and again to new research, service ideation results in prototyping and pilots that are, in turn, fuel for new ideas and service concepts.

In addition, service design is complex and immaterial by nature, thus calling for analytical approach. This is why everybody in service design should read literature of a variety of fields. Not necessarily books that have the words ‘service design’ in their title. In fact, I underlined the need for the variety of useful literature by introducing students attending my service design lectures to about 30 books from as many different fields.

The core to studies (and competence development) in service design is advancing one’s own thinking. Service designers and others working in and around the field should understand the various dimensions of the challenges their customers are faced with and be able to illustrate and depict those challenges in different ways (e.g. through mind mapping). In many ways service design is close to design thinking. Currently it seems that design thinking methodology and service design viewpoints are merging into a competence field that is more interesting than ever before.

As a field service design is amidst intensive development. This is why we need service analysis and service design critique. Who knows, we might even be able to pave way for analytic approaches and critique in other fields of design.

On Service Design Critique # 1

Jari Koskinen — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 10:52:40 +0300

There is a common belief that quality of design would somehow be a matter of taste. It is utter nonsense, because were it so, teaching design and competence development on e.g. the field of service design would prove impossible.

On the other hand, users’ opinions are extremely relevant where quality of design is concerned. Consumers (/clients) can provide valuable feedback for service development. However, this doesn mean that quality of service design could be measured in mere opinions.

“If I´d asked my customers what they wanted, they’d have said a faster horse.”
–Henry Ford

The above quote from the father of industrial car manufacturing describes the importance of vision in design. Ever so often clients and customers are unable to imagine a different kind of a product or service – a different kind of world, if you will. It is the designers’ task.

Flattening the quality of (service) design into a matter of taste is impossible also because designers, or in case of service design a multidisciplinary team of professionals, have to consider a multitude of different viewpoints and challenges in the design process. The criteria for good design cannot even be limited to usability and aesthetics; it is easy to find dozens of viewpoints that need to be taken into account in assessing the quality of design.

Process and nature of service design work

Tuomo Kuosa — Sat, 17 Sep 2011 21:07:46 +0300

According to Digital evolution designer Mika Ilari Koskinen, service design is part of the concept design process in YATTA. It is typically used at the early phase, where it is needed to gather information and observe end users in real actions. Typically these kinds of projects are carried out within a service design frame, e.g. user segmentations and service paths. To continue, the work of a service designer in a project is like the work of a movie director, says service designer Mikko Koivisto from YATTA. He has to work with movie producers, financers, scriptwriters, actors, pyrotechnicians, and other assisting staff and he has to adopt and operationalize lots of things to achieve his visions in the project. If a space is at the focus, he needs to get an interior architect and so on.

Because service design is so praxis and goal oriented work, most service design enthusiasts are, according to Reima Rönnholm, hands-on people. As corporate decisions are made on the management level, service designers need to be able to sell their ideas to managers and execs. In this sense it would be good if company boards included people who understand service design.

Even though service design is done in unique projects that cannot be standardized, Esa Rauhala from Palmu Inc. states that it might be possible, in principle, to do some digital service design projects with a product orientation. This could include, for example, the sales of standardized service models realised through separate design modules.

Expertise needs of the design field in the future #1

Tuomo Kuosa — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 11:12:54 +0300

Digital evolution designer Mika Ilari Koskinen stated in his interview that the new experts of the design field (and service design) are coming from all educational backgrounds in the future, not just a few like it was before, but they all go to work into the expanding creative industry (design + applied arts) and experience industry. He was able to locate the following six specific expertise needs of the design field in the future:

Business development experience and competences are needed in design field in the future. This refers to people who have significant experience in business.
Information architecture designers are highly needed too. This contains the following levels: substance level, user interface level, information security level, etc.
3D (physical and spatial) designers will be increasingly needed.
Abilities to influence the economy and politics. This is important as big changes in the field and in production markets are needed.
Abilities to understand the change is becoming more important.
Abilities to establish and maintain all kinds of networkers will be vitally important in the future as well.

The Postmodern Media Society and the Ecstasy of Communication

Sam Inkinen — Sun, 31 Jul 2011 12:32:42 +0300

In the postmodern media society, one can say without exaggeration that digital information, telecommunication technology and new media intrude ever deeper into people’s everyday lives.

For example, the Internet and mobile phone cultures (including games) of recent years have had concrete and remarkable effects on the media practices and everyday routines of contemporaries.

As technical integration has travelled towards a “smart phone” and “communicator” that utilizes networking, dynamic multimedia, games, artificial intelligence and more advanced hypertextual methods, the meaning of a mobile device (a mobile phone, a tablet computer such as iPad, etc.) as an “identity device” has become increasingly important.

In his classic, Transparent Society (1989), Italian philosopher Gianni Vattimo has aptly stated that in the contemporary media culture “everything” becomes a subject of communication. Jean Baudrillard, on the other hand, has sharply commented on and analyzed the postmodern condition as the “ecstasy of communication.”

The commercial logic of show business, different kinds of spectacles and extended experiences will irrevocably lead to the expansion of the sphere of media publicity to touch areas that have been previously considered private (reality TVs, Internet Web-cam applications, picture messages sent via mobile phones, next generation of computer games, etc.).

As media based on images, audio and text – i.e. dynamic, interactive multimedia – is assuming an increasingly central role in (digital) culture, the interpretation, decoding and understanding of multimedial and multimodal messages becomes more important. The aesthetic element, that is part of the original definition of education, gains new meaning and its role is emphasized.

It can also be seen that the effects of computer networks, video games, hypermedia, virtual realities, robotics etc. will reach (nearly) all areas of life and touch almost everyone – even those who are not directly interested in, or connected to them.

Literature

Baudrillard, Jean (1983). Simulations. New York: Semiotext(e).

Baudrillard, Jean (1988). The Ecstasy of Communication. New York: Semiotext(e).

Bauman, Zygmunt (1995). Postmodern Ethics. Oxford & Cambridge, MA: Blackwell.

Bauman, Zygmunt (1995). Life in Fragments. Essays in Postmodern Morality. Oxford & Cambridge, MA: Blackwell.

Leino, Olli & Wirman, Hanna & Fernandez, Amyris (eds.) (2008). Extending Experiences. Structure, analysis and design of computer game player experience. Rovaniemi: University of Lapland.

Vattimo, Gianni (1992) [1989]. Transparent Society. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.

Ubiquitous technology (r)evolution and new service design thinking challenges in the media houses

Jari Kaivo-oja — Sun, 19 Jun 2011 08:28:37 +0300

With the continuous and rapid development of digital technologies, postmodern societies will experience a new technological revolution, which is today -- called the “Ubiquitous Revolution”. The core vision for the future is the digital revolution that is currently dominating postmodern societies throughout the world. Discussions about information or knowledge societies are closely connected to ubiquitous revolution.

Ubiquitous refers to pervasive, embedded information technology that works imperceptibly. Some people talk about pervasive computing. The term ‘ubiquitous computing’ was first defined in the late 1980s by Mark Weiser of the Xerox laboratory. The goal was to achieve technology with such a subtle, easy-to-use presence that it goes unnoticed. Discussions on ubiquitous society involve such concepts as “smart” spaces and materials and mediated built environments. It also includes mediated environments, which will one of key issues for the media in the future.

Wikipedia definition of ubiquitous computing is: "machines that fit the human environment instead of forcing humans to enter theirs”. In a way human communication will be technically easier in the future, but also new complex relationships will emerge.

The fundamental concept of ubiquitous revolution is cloud computing. Cloud computing means that the computing is "in the cloud" i.e. the processing (and the related data) is not in a specified, known or static place(s). This is in opposition to where the processing takes place in one or more specific servers that are known. Cloud computing provides a new platform for companies, governments, industries, and also for the media houses. The concept of cloud media house should be studied more.

Many other concepts are supplementary or complementary to this ubiquitous technology. Such concepts are Web 2.0, ubiquitous computing (ubicomputing), pervasive computing, technology everywhere, ambient intelligence, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, human-centered computing, virtual reality, cyber reality, second reality, nomadic computing, smart dust, internet of things, Man-Machine systems, soft-hardware systems, etc.

It is very important to understand that ubiquitous revolution includes not only man-machine interaction and communication. It includes also man-man interaction and machine to machine interaction. Innovative co-creation happens in all three key interactions. All this means that the borderlines between real reality and virtual reality will be partly disappear. Also the borderlines between physical and digital experiences vanish totally or partly. This will imply many new challenges to the media houses. The media must cover both realities, virtual and real realities, but also physical and digital experiences. There will be new challenges for content production of the media.

Actually in the future we will move from social media to ubiquitous media, although on-going social media revolution is a very big challenge for conventional media houses, which still partly live the age of broadcasting media or interactive media operations. Lags and log-ins of development are a part of cultural co-evolution.

An essential thing to understand is that new wave of ubiquitous innovations will bring us many new concepts and “language games”. Defining ubiquitous revolution will not be easy. Every innovation includes always novel ideas and novel inventions, so it is very important develop such new language games and concepts that people can really understand the essence of ubiquitous technology novelties. As we know, media plays here a big strategic role. Philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein already talked about “language games”. During ubiquitous revolution many new language games will be introduced. The media creates, co-creates and analyses these language games every day. New bright ideas of innovation journalism are needed in this techno-cultural transformation process.

Also the role of service design and service architectures will be important. The media must plan carefully their service designs and architectures, and also their business models. In other case they will meet increasing economical problems. Recent Harvard Business Review (2010) on business model innovation is necessary reading for the leaders of media houses. Many experts have noted that in the future business model innovation can be more important than technological innovations. Finding a new core business in the media does not happen without new business innovations.

Ubiquitous revolution includes different kind of innovations, not only technical innovations. We will need new technical innovations, new business innovations and social innovations to “survive” ubiquitous revolution. Also the relative importance of systemic innovations is growing because of the ubiquitous revolution. Autonomous innovations are not easily developed in the ubiquitous technology environments. This aspect of development is crucial for the media and especially for the media networks.

The power of co-creation will be a big challenge for the media houses. Famous scholars Venkat Ramaswamy and Francis Gouillart (Free Press, 2010) are talking in their book, “The Power of Co-Creation” about the co-creation (CC) principle. This principle means: “engaging people to create valuable experiences together while enhancing network economics”. According to the authors, co-creation principle has four components: Experience mindset, context of interactions, engagement platforms and network relationships. All these components are critical for the future media.

For example, Apple embraced co-creation principle to enhance the speed and scope of its innovation, generating over 1 $ billion for its App-Store partner developers in two years. Also Starbucks has launched its MyStarbucksIdea.com to create and tap into new ideas from customers. Many other successful corporations (like Nike and Unilever) have adopted the co-creation principle. We can conclude that the co-creation principle is already working and bringing good results. We can expect that also media houses can get nice results with the adoption of the CC principle.

Of course, the famous CC principle, which was introduced by Venkat Ramaswamy, Francis Gouillart and C.K. Prahalad, requires special planning skills of service design and architecture. The new media needs discovery-driven planning and pilot experiments.

When we put these 4 components smartly together, these four components will move the media and other associated organizations to new era of ubiquitous media, where the power of co-creation plays a central strategic role.

Ubiquitous revolution thus refers to the co-creation of an environment, which is seamlessly embedded with computational devices and mechanisms that provide necessary information and services to the user, based on the information that is automatically sensed from the physical and computational surrounding. Technological innovations have already brought on changes to traditional lifestyles.

When people´s lifestyles will change, also the role of media changes simultaneously. Ubiquitous revolution will change many things in our everyday life, but also our communication ways and processes. Media will need more human-centered thinking, when they develop their media contents and products.

Also the work of journalists will change because of ubiquitous revolution. New tech applications of smart grid, smart media houses and smart mobility tools will probably lead to the emergence of cyber journalism or ubijournalism. In the future all the journalists are innovation journalists, if they will stay in the media business.

We can expect that especially autos will be changed to mini media houses, where journalists can work with much higher efficiency than today. Thus, one key development object of journalism will be the ubiautomedia. Already now auto industry works heavily with these tech applications. Another interesting field of journalism will be gaming journalism. According to Scientific American (Dec 2010 Issue) the Game of Life is being a part of normal human life. In the future bringing joysticks and scoreboards into our daily routine may be the key to making us better people.

Ubiquitous revolution will bring personalized avatars to journalism work process and to our e-home office. We can have assistants who do what we want them to do. The costs of assistants are much lower than current knowledge workers. This change will also change the logic of journalism and associated work processes.

Service design at home: Defining a hidden source of welfare and productivity

Jari Kaivo-oja — Sat, 18 Jun 2011 16:26:40 +0300

Service design is often understood wrongly. Many expect that service design is something only for public or company demands. This is a wrong belief that we should get rid of - as soon as possible. Service design thinking can be applied also at home. Home is our key service of life. We can even claim that good service design can change our life at home, and probably to a better direction. How this all happens?

At home we can focus on the three most important parts of a home: sleeping spaces, living spaces and working spaces. All spaces create special challenges for service design.

How we can approach the service design for sleeping spaces? Typically sleeping space and especially bedroom are planned for taking a rest and relaxing. Reproduction of work happens in a sleeping space. Privacy awareness is a key issue when we plan sleeping spaces for people.

In many homes, bedrooms tend to be on the quiet side of a house. Bed room can be high impact space for human welfare. We know that human beings use a lot of their time sleeping. The quality of sleeping is a central element of our personal welfare. Good and ergonomic beds add a lot to the quality of sleeping time. Some people like also change their bedrooms to be like oriental or sport massage rooms. Many technical and bed design solutions are available for these kinds of special needs. Professional interior service designers should know the best bed solutions for people. Also mood-elevating splashes of color are just what people need in sleeping spaces.

We can also use ambience design ideas (5 senses framework) to plan sleeping spaces. Fun and lighthearted bedroom is the best output of professional service design. After all it is possible to combine livability and high spirits by professional service design solutions.

Living spaces are our showrooms to the public and friends. Living rooms should be living rooms and comfortable spaces for many human needs, for normal living, gaming, entertainment, playing etc. In living room we can represent the best aspects of our lives: photographs, art, awesome stereo music experience, musical instruments, books, games, and everything which makes our life better. In a good living room you want spend your time in. Typically people like in their homes show their style, values, and all the important things of life. Essential things are good sofa, rug, carpets, reading chair, lamps and furniture arrangements. Professional service designers find key ideas, problems and solutions for well-functioning living spaces.

Key question in planning work space is: Does your work space work? Our livelihood depends on it. Thus this question is really an important question, not a marginal issue of life. A comfortable and good-looking work space can increase productivity and efficiency of our work. Many people do not think this aspect of work space too much. So there a huge market to improve our productivity by service design solution that work. In optimal situations a great work space can give our work a boost.

Most people spend their time in their offices as they do in their living rooms. Thus, work space planning is a big issue for your personal productivity, but also for you welfare. So, all the elements of fun are needed to plan a good work space. In a good workspace you are going to be empowered and motivated.

Service-designed workspace should encourage you to brainstorm and organize all key elements of working: your files, your laptop, your notes, your big ideas and yourself. It is very important to make work space aesthetically pleasing and make it a work space that enables you to get self-organized easily. An optimal work space makes you feel good. It also makes you feel like you can succeed at whatever you are doing. Work is work and sometimes work is hard and demanding. Work space is not a marginal service design challenge.

Economists are much talking about productivity and efficiency, but less talks and lectures are presented about work spaces at home. There is big productivity gain available at our homes, in our ordinary work spaces. Service design could help us to get all these benefits to the wealth of our society.

When we shall find our hidden source of welfare and productivity? Service design can help us to answer to this critical question.

New Media Experiences

Sam Inkinen — Wed, 04 May 2011 23:04:09 +0300

In the contemporary world, our way of living is increasingly mediated and even expanded by media experiences. We are living, in fact, in the age of experience design. Mediated, first-hand experiences are giving way (at least to some extent) to synthetic experiences generated by new media.

“Experience,” "experience industry," “experience economy” (Pine & Gilmore 1999), and “experience society” (German, Die Erlebnisgesellschaft, see Schulze 1992) have become central themes and notions to describe contemporary society, economy, and culture.

The deeper semantic meaning of these catchphrases, however, is not simple. They are very complicated and open to different associations. Various kinds of experiences, spectacles, and effects clearly belong to the millennial Zeitgeist (spirit of the age) of the early 2000s.

Historical background is relevant also in this context. Few contemporaries remember, for example, that futurist-visionary Alvin Toffler had already referred to the significance of industrially manufactured experiences in his classic book Future Shock (1970).

Video and computer games as a remarkable growth field of digital media culture and digital ecosystems are one example of developments in today’s “dream society” (see Jensen 1999) and “experience economy.” To cite the Finnish scholar:

“Digital media and games are knocking on experience economy’s door, and they are becoming more and more connected to experience production and to the field of experience industry. Gaming and storytelling via different channels have throughout the ages been an important part of our everyday life as well as a form of entertainment. During the recent years, game design and digital media productions have also become an increasingly significant business sector with remarkable growth rates.” (Kylänen 2006: 3)

Further Reading

Debord, Guy (nd.) [1967]. The Society of the Spectacle. <http://www.bopsecrets.org/SI/debord/index.htm>.

Inkinen, Sam (2008). Quo vadis, homo ludens? (preface). Teoksessa Fernandez, A. & Leino, O. & Wirman, H. (eds.), Extending Experiences. Rovaniemi: Lapin yliopistokustannus, pp. 9–17.

Jensen, Rolf (1999). The Dream Society. How the Coming Shift from Information to Imagination Will Transform Your Business. New York: McGraw-Hill.

Kylänen, Mika (ed) (2006). Digital Media & Games. Articles on Experiences 4. Rovaniemi: Lapland Centre of Expertise for the Experience Industry (LCEEI).

Pine, Joseph II & Gilmore, James H. (1999). The Experience Economy. Boston, MA.: Harvard Business School Press.

Schulze, Gerhard (1992). Die Erlebnisgesellschaft. Kultursoziologie der Gegenwart. Fulda: Campus Verlag.

Tarssanen, Sanna & Kylänen, Mika (2006). A Theoretical Model for Producing Experiences – A Touristic Perspective. In: Kylänen, Mika (ed.), Articles on Experiences 2, 134-154. Rovaniemi: Lapland Centre of Expertise for the Experience Industry.

Toffler, Alvin (1970). Future Shock. New York: Bantam Books.

Roots of the tool box of service design

Tuomo Kuosa — Wed, 06 Apr 2011 13:50:16 +0300

Difference between design and service design is in the method of observation. SD focuses on customers’ needs and attempts to design everything from that point of view. In the industrial society we had industrial design. In service society we have service design. The principles of design are always applied to manufacturing processes of one particular time. People are designing things that they are working with basing on what they are trying to accomplish, says Digital evolution designer Mika Ilari Koskinen.

Service designer Mikko Koivisto emphasizes that the core of SD is the method of mapping the needs of persons x and y, and producing services to fulfill those needs. Its distant predecessor was user centric design, which was based on the idea of creating a product first and then attempting to modify it a little for the needs of x and y. It was followed by design management and experience design, but they didn’t have any systematic methods. Finally, when SD came into use, the practices of designing services started to became much more systematic. Today SD has a systematic tool box which has replaced the use of the previous concepts and approaches.

According to Koivisto, SD has obtained most of its approaches and methodologies to its tool box from: i) interaction design, ii) services marketing, iii) ethnography/cultural studies, and iv) industrial design. Some ideas it has obtained from v) performing arts, vi) work site management, and vii) pedagogy (as there are lots of learning processes linked to services). Also viii) systems design has brought some ideas to SD, but its role has been small. There are no specific technologies in SD. Mobile services have influenced the mapping of service paths, so they have been taken into the tool box.